Developer guide shows how RAG chunking can split key facts across pieces, breaking retrieval

A DEV Community article explains that retrieval-augmented generation systems can fail when document chunks are cut badly, even if the answer is indexed. It describes three common problems: fixed-size splits that break sentences, chunks that lose their section headings, and chunks that are too small or too large to carry meaning. The author uses a made-up API key docs page to show how a fact about key rotation can be separated from the topic it answers. A small Python script is offered to compare fixed-size and heading-based splitting and flag problematic chunks before embeddings or prompts are adjusted.